


If I Fail, I'll Fall Apart

by UniverseOnHerShoulders



Series: Series 12 Vignettes [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode: s12e01 Spyfall Part 1, Gen, Identity Reveal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:34:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22113442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UniverseOnHerShoulders/pseuds/UniverseOnHerShoulders
Summary: "There's always collateral damage with you and me. It's our Paris."Aboard a VOR jet, with Missy's words ringing in her ears, the Doctor discovers the truth about O.
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor & The Master (Dhawan)
Series: Series 12 Vignettes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1731406
Comments: 14
Kudos: 136





	If I Fail, I'll Fall Apart

**Author's Note:**

> Written post-Spyfall Part 1, pre-Spyfall Part 2, because I'm obsessed with 13's reaction to learning the truth about O and I needed to write about the internal thoughts which accompany that stunning piece of acting.

“Oh. Come on, Doctor, catch up. You can do it,” O’s voice is mocking as he strides along the aisle of the plane, clicking his fingers as he goes in the manner of an impatient schoolteacher, and the Doctor looks around herself in abject confusion, racking her brain for anything that might provide some kind of explanation as to what exactly is going on. The plane is still flying, which is immediately indicative of… well, something, at the very least, although she can’t quite put her finger on what. Whoever O might be, he doesn’t want her immediately dead, which in some ways provides her with a modicum of reassurance, while in others the thought is entirely horrifying; the alternative is far worse, at least to her, because she knows well enough the awful things that others can do when they want to prolong someone’s suffering. Whoever O really is, she suspects that he is someone who wants her to suffer first. Not only that, he’s someone who has the ability to make their house fly, and someone who can assume the identity of another, wearing it like a disguise.

No, she thinks to herself. Not _like_ a disguise; _as_ a disguise.

There’s only one person in the universe who could possibly hate her with such absolute malice that they would want her to suffer; only one person who could come up with a scheme this diabolical; only one person who could slip into disguises like water. There are several candidates who could make houses fly, not least the former might of UNIT if they’d tried hard enough, but in concurrence with the other evidence, there seems to be only one likely explanation. How could she have failed to notice? Had she truly been so caught up in their investigation that she’d failed to notice what is now glaringly obvious to her?

She closes her eyes, trying to tune out the noise of the plane’s engines and the white-hot feeling of panic creeping through her system; blocking out her racing thoughts and the sound of her own double heartbeat as it accelerates in her chest.

It’s there, at the edges of her consciousness. Another mind; another presence; and one that is horrifyingly familiar. It seems to acknowledge her with a jaunty little salute, and her eyes snap open again as she realises her suspicions and worst fears are correct; this is exactly who she thinks it is, and the crashing realisation makes her blood run cold.

“Oh,” she says in a small, shaking voice, unable to manage anything more eloquent.

“That’s… that’s my name, and that is why I chose it,” O says, his smirk widening with each word he says, and the bastard seems to be enjoying this; seems to love playing to his captive audience. Some things never change.

He’s looking at her like a cat that’s got the cream, and the Doctor wants nothing more than to scream, to say something to rebuke him, to act to stop him, but she’s frozen where she is, paralysed by terror and confusion. “So satisfying. Doctor, I did say look for the spymaster. Or should I say spy… Master?” he gives a cocky little wave, his expression gleeful as he realises she has understood. “Hi!”

Dead. He – she – had been dead; the Doctor had seen it with her own eyes. Once the trauma of her regeneration had passed, once the battle was over and the smoke and fire had cleared, she had gone back to the space station where everything had changed and found where her oldest friend had fallen for the final time. There was no body – she supposes, now, that that should have been a clue, but at the time it had only broken her heart – but the stench of death was so prevalent, soaking into the ground and filling her with intrinsic dread, that she had accepted it as a foregone conclusion, without question or critical analysis. She had believed, truly believed, that Missy had met her end there, and yet here the Master is, larger than life and more sure of himself than ever.

A small, irrational part of her is glad of his presence; wants to go and fling her arms around him and thank Rassilon that she’s no longer the Last of the Time Lords. Wants to sit down with him and find out how he did it; how he managed to go from death to this. Wants to greet him as an old friend, and remember the old days. The aching yearning for such a reunion sits heavily in her stomach, and it takes all of her self-control to not greet him as the friend he had once been. Still could be, perhaps; she had succeeded with Missy, had she not? Perhaps she could again.

And yet, she knows she cannot think of him in such positive terms; cannot treat him as an old friend, because this new Master is an unknown quantity. He _should_ be dead, and yet this is not the first time he has defied the odds; not the first time he has cheated the Grim Reaper. As Harold Saxon, he had survived cremation, a corrupt reincarnation and then his self-banishment to Gallifrey, lost in another dimension. Despite the apparently impossibility of it, he had escaped the planet that had once been their home and come for her again, playing the long game with dogged determination. He had always had a remarkable, unparalleled knack for survival that took her breath away, and yet now she can’t help but find it discomfiting and frightening; the shock of it all leaving her unsteady on her feet. Missy had been dead, and she had grieved her and made peace with that fact. Despite her betrayal, the Doctor had mourned for her oldest friend, and she had come to terms with once again being the last of her kind.

Yet now… now she is not, and more concerningly, all that Missy seemed to have learnt appears to have been lost with the agony of regeneration. The man stood before them is not a good man or a rehabilitated man. This is a man who wants to play games with their lives; a man who has them over a barrel and is gleefully revelling in the power trip.

The realisation that he wants to kill her is one that comes, strangely, with a curious sense of resignation. There’s no anger or fear as she mentally lays out the bare facts of the matter; no urge to fight it or desire to change the outcome. There is only a sense of weariness that for the thousandth time they are playing the same game of cat and mouse, and that for the thousandth time, her best enemy seems to think that the surest way to attract her attention is to make overtures on her life.

Why can’t he just talk to her? Why must there always be this incessant, all-consuming need for attention that he always tries to satiate by attempting to kill her? It would be far too simple, she supposes, for him to simply call her or text her; would be far too easy to stick her in a WhatsApp group or try to reach her via FaceTime. No; instead there must be the war games and the assassination attempts; the planetary invasions and the dastardly schemes, and each time she grows a little wearier of it all; each time it becomes more of a trial to be endured. She had thought that with Missy she had made progress by teaching her to be good, and now it appears that with one regeneration, all the effort and time she had put in to encouraging her friend to become a contrite, warm-hearted person has been wasted, because with the change of body and face has come a change of personality management, and this management appear to be hell-bent on one thing: regressing the Master to their previous role as Queen – Monarch? – of Evil.

She wants to say this aloud – thinks about it, even; thinks about giving the Master a hug and a punch in the arm and a general warning about not reverting to type before she inevitably stops him, but before she can do that, she realises something crushing; something which robs her of the ability to breathe.

This is no longer just about her. It doesn’t matter what happens to her, not really; she’s disposable; expendable; renewable. Death or injury are not appealing prospects, but if the worst comes to the worst she can at least regenerate into someone new. But her friends? They’re breakable, fragile humans with finite lifespans, and the Master seems intent on killing them too. Worse still, he seems intent on ensuring she witnesses their final agony, and the thought of that is like a dagger to the hearts. Having to watch them suffer; having to watch the light leave their eyes – the very idea of it is anathema to her, and the thought of it fills her with revulsion. She won’t let it happen; _can’t_ let it happen, and she knows that irrespective of what happens to her, she must prevent their deaths.

Looking around at her friends, she feels her resolve solidify, and swears to herself that no matter what the cost, she will save them.

* * *

As the Doctor looks around the strange, kelp-like forest she is now stood in, she shakes her head hard in a bid to clear it. This isn’t right – this isn’t how it should be. Regardless of how she got here, she needs to go back – needs to return to the plane and do what she can to save her friends from her best enemy.

She should have seen this coming. The Master, after all, knows her almost as well as she knows herself; she should have realised that the only thing more perversely appealing to him than making her watch her friends die is to prevent her from doing do; to prevent her from bearing witness to their final seconds. He thinks that this gives him power over her; thinks it’ll break her to trap her here, away from them and yet knowing their seemingly-inescapable fate.

He’s wrong.

“I’m coming back for you,” she vows aloud. “Yaz, Ryan, Graham. I’m coming back, and I’m going to save you.”


End file.
